A “Solution” to the Growing Number of Gap Wedges

[onthehunt526]

This thread is not about loft creep. I actually believe the engineers when they say that it’s necessary in order to maintain the trajectory that they are trying to design for. Is it 100% necessary. I think a 38°-39° PW is pushing it a little bit far... but I digress.

The Titleist T400 irons start with a 5-iron and go to PW then have a W1, W2, W3 which I think are 43, 48, 53 (I’d have to look to be sure.) But it got me thinking. If you’re having to put 2 Gap Wedges between your PW and SW, why not just call your current PW a 10-iron? I mean yes it’s a little radical, but so is 3 gap wedges. I mean why stop numbering irons at 9, when there are 11-woods at least in the major OEMs.

IMHO, I really don’t care what number is on the bottom of the club, as long as I know how far it goes. So why do OEMs stop iron numbers at 9?

[Vinsk]

5 hours ago, onthehunt526 said:

This thread is not about loft creep. I actually believe the engineers when they say that it’s necessary in order to maintain the trajectory that they are trying to design for. Is it 100% necessary. I think a 38°-39° PW is pushing it a little bit far... but I digress.

The Titleist T400 irons start with a 5-iron and go to PW then have a W1, W2, W3 which I think are 43, 48, 53 (I’d have to look to be sure.) But it got me thinking. If you’re having to put 2 Gap Wedges between your PW and SW, why not just call your current PW a 10-iron? I mean yes it’s a little radical, but so is 3 gap wedges. I mean why stop numbering irons at 9, when there are 11-woods at least in the major OEMs.

IMHO, I really don’t care what number is on the bottom of the club, as long as I know how far it goes. So why do OEMs stop iron numbers at 9?

This won’t be a popular response as I’ve said it before in another way...but for many it’s entertainment really. So, so many golfers aren’t really consistent enough to hit their wedges an exact distance where gapping is really a bold problem. Come on. I’ve heard golfers say hilarious things like ‘ I have a 6yd gap I need to fill.’ Yeah no. So often golfers ignore or forget that they can develop quarter and half swings etc. All this ‘gapping’ gets a little overboard to me. 

[billchao]

5 hours ago, onthehunt526 said:

The Titleist T400 irons start with a 5-iron and go to PW then have a W1, W2, W3 which I think are 43, 48, 53 (I’d have to look to be sure.) But it got me thinking. If you’re having to put 2 Gap Wedges between your PW and SW, why not just call your current PW a 10-iron?

You’re overthinking it. You don’t need a wedge to fill the gap between your highest lofted wedge and your xE1.

[iacas]

If 10 why not W2? 🙂

[Adam C]

I like the idea of just putting loft numbers on irons instead of club numbers but good old golf with it's traditions probably won't ever change club numbering. I also realize that putting lofts on heads goes out the window if you have the clubs bent.

[iacas]

13 minutes ago, Adam C said:

I like the idea of just putting loft numbers on irons instead of club numbers but good old golf with it's traditions probably won't ever change club numbering. I also realize that putting lofts on heads goes out the window if you have the clubs bent.

Lofts would be even more confusing. It's more numbers than current.

[boogielicious]

1 hour ago, iacas said:

Lofts would be even more confusing. It's more numbers than current.

Didn’t Ryan Moore do that for a while? It would be confusing. I think of my irons more in distance than number.

[colin007]

9 out of 10 dudes on just about any muni in America have no clue how far their wedges/irons/woods really go. When was the last time you saw someone hit a full wedge from 130 yards and not either skull it or come in 2 inches behind the ball? Gaps are not really the issue for most people, much less what the number on the bottom of the club says. Myself primarily included.

Edited December 24, 2020 by colin007
Forgot something

[Adam C]

44 minutes ago, boogielicious said:

Didn’t Ryan Moore do that for a while? It would be confusing. I think of my irons more in distance than number.

I've seen pros actually write distances their irons travel in sharpie on the irons.

[TourSpoon]

I remember seeing the Diawa Hi Tracs back in the late 80s that had the 10 iron as the name of their pitching wedge kind of like how Hogan used the E for equalizer for the PW. Tommy Armour 845s had a 48 pw and then had W2, W3, and W4 (52, 56, 60) as naming conventions. I have seen recently Homna uses the 10 iron and 11 iron which seems like a traditional pw loft. 

In my world, my current pw is 46 and I play it as a10 iron and my 50 gap is my pitching wedge based on the job I ask it to do. To the point of the OP, I have an issue of calling a 43 degree short iron a pw (in the case of T400, 43 is a gap) on principal. 

I remember seeing some of your other posts and I was thinking why you are playing the T400 but then see in your profile you are a Srixon guy. I think at some point the marketing for the T400 target audience is trying to capture the moderate swing speed guys who need help getting the ball into the air. Still, calling the club with an 8 iron loft a pw is a little much. 

[onthehunt526]

What I’m getting at is an SGI PW isn’t a wedge. How can you call a 38°-41° club a wedge? It’s really not. It’s an 10-iron. 42-44° on a PW is pushing it, but it’s still in reality a 10-iron.

You can stamp whatever you want on the bottom of a club, you can call it Bob or Joe if you want. But “wedges” are meant for finesse and control. Yes, short irons are for control, too. Clubs that are 38°-44° are irons, not wedges. (Although the USGA classifies wedges as irons, and hybrids either irons or woods depending on their type.) A 43° club is an iron not a super gap wedge. 
 

[TourSpoon]

I am with you. A pitching wedge has a job to do and at 38* degrees its been reduced to a bump and run 8 iron. Its like the pitching wedge didn't get the respect that the sand wedge and lob wedge got where they had very specific jobs and due to lofts needed in the sand they pretty much are where they started. Like I said before my 50* gapper is my pw and my pw is my 10 iron. 

[DaveP043]

On 12/24/2020 at 2:58 PM, onthehunt526 said:

You can stamp whatever you want on the bottom of a club, you can call it Bob or Joe if you want. But “wedges” are meant for finesse and control.

This is an interesting contradiction.  You say we can call them whatever we want, but if you call a 42° club a "wedge" its wrong somehow.  What matters to me is how high it goes, and how far.

[gjunkie57]

As long as it works for you call it what you want.  Callamity Jane, Billy Boule’, Mickey Mouse or Moe, Larry and Curly.  As long as it lands the ball on the green.  

[onthehunt526]

These SGI set “wedges” don’t act like wedges though. The T400 PW at best acts like a 9-iron, the W1 like a 10-iron and the W2 acts like an 11-iron... you can name all the irons ABCDEFG... and have Elmo, Rosetta, Murray, Zoe, Oscar the Grouch, and Big Bird talk about the iron of the day instead of the letter of the day.

[saevel25]

Labelling doesn't matter. You are going to buy 1 driver, 2-4 woods/hybrids, and 2-3 wedges. That leaves 6-8 irons to fill in the gaps. It doesn't matter what they are labelled as long as you have proper club fitting. Then you know what you hit and that is all that matters. 

 

[nclra]

Like with all the engineering computer modeling etc thats being used,  they cant build a proper launch angle into a pw thats higher lofted? That ridiculous on its face. Its a competition for 7 iron distance and the only way the get that is to lower the loft and increase the launch angle on your 7 iron.. And you get whats happening now. You need a crap load of wedges to fill the bottom and more hybrids at the top due to the gaps being compressed.  Your 7 iron goes farther but the rest of your set is messed up. 

 

 

[boogielicious]

7 hours ago, nclra said:

Like with all the engineering computer modeling etc thats being used,  they cant build a proper launch angle into a pw thats higher lofted? That ridiculous on its face. Its a competition for 7 iron distance and the only way the get that is to lower the loft and increase the launch angle on your 7 iron.. And you get whats happening now. You need a crap load of wedges to fill the bottom and more hybrids at the top due to the gaps being compressed.  Your 7 iron goes farther but the rest of your set is messed up. 

 

 

Of course they can. The MB and CB pitching wedges for most OEM models have more traditional lofts. My Mizuno MP59 is 46 degrees and my Titleist 716 CB is 47. They launch high for me.

The other models they have are a different kind of iron, so they launch differently. The only thing that is confusing customers is the number on the sole. We get irked at times from the marketing folks for doing this. But what we really should focus on is the carry, dispersion and spin for each iron and wedge and not the number on the bottom.